Navigating Complex Systems

Tag: shared understanding

Rebecca Wirfs-Brock and I developed a workshop on decision making in software architecture. This is an extract from a paper from the IEEE International Conference on Software Architecture (ICSA 2019) that describes the workshop. The final version is in the ICSA proceedings. A preprint of the full paper is available here.

Abstract

First, we shape our architecture. Then, our architecture shapes us. As architects we bring part of ourselves to the systems we work with. We evolve with our architectures. In this tutorial we consider the metaphor of “terroir” to understand architectures and their sense of place. Terroir comes from the French word used to describe the set of all environmental factors that affect the observable characteristics of an organism, e.g., the unique set of contextual characteristics of place that influence food crops, coffee, tea, or wine. So too in systems, architectures are uniquely shaped by the culture and context of a place. Factors include people, organization, culture, technology, and tenets shared among the architects and makers. Understanding an architecture is a first step towards evaluating it. The set of concepts and practical tools covered in this tutorial are well suited to being used in conducting architecture analyses and reviews and integrate with any other processes an organization might be using.

Structure and Outline

Part 1: Making sense of system architectures. The tutorial begins by introducing some concepts that help people to make sense of a system architecture. The outcome includes insight not just into the architecture itself, but also the wider context, including culture, decision-making processes, attitudes, constraints, and assumptions that contribute to the architecture. We will demonstrate how to see and interpret patterns to understand architecture context and understand the decision-making landscape of which architects are part.

Part 2: Decision models for architects. Having established a sense of place for the architecture, we will move into discussing decision models. Different kinds of decision are necessary to evolve our architectures. Sometimes we need to make high-stakes decisions under conditions of uncertainty, with insufficient information, and too little time. Other times we need to balance deep thought, collaboration, and trade-offs among different architecture qualities.

Part 3: Taking action to evolve our architectures in conditions of uncertainty. Once we have a sense of place, and we have decided how we will make decisions, we will move into action. In this tutorial we focus on making decisions and acting in conditions of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. We explore the roles of heuristics and experimentation for making decisions under such conditions, and how this influences the evolution and evolve-ability of our architectures.

Part 4: Practical considerations for the dimension of time in architecture decisions. In this section we will look at the temporal dimensions of architecture decisions. We will look at the time factors that affect our architectures. These include when decisions are made, the cadence of decision making, the impact of decisions over time, and challenges around ensuring follow-through and consistency of decisions over time.

Part 5: Summary and closing activities. Summary of concepts, decision models and tools; Q&A. In this section we spend time to ensure participants have at least one or two practical things they are ready to try when they get back to the office.